I’ve got my laptop computer sitting here, and I’ve got the screen turned on my digital camera, and I happen to point the camera at the computer, and I see this flashing light on the front of the computer that I’ve never seen before. I check the documentation and this turns out to be the machine’s infrared port.
I’m guessing that the manufacture of the camera’s color sensors must’ve tried to match the frequency response of the retina’s “red” cone receptors, but failed, or compromised for cost reasons.
Or did they do it on purpose? In the analog camera magazine I’ve read some photographers choose infrared film to give an artistic glow to the subject. Would a typical consumer prefer a camera that records infrared as red, perhaps without understanding why?
Infared is not totally invisiable to the human eye depending on where in the infared spectrum you are… I have not tried it with a digital camera. Need more info, camer brand and model, computer brand and model etc. why not take a pic and put up on your computer and see what you see.?
Used to could see the signal of an infared distance meter and always could see it in the reflector if we were close enought, like under a couple hundred feet,
In all probability, the infrared meter in question DOES bleed into the visible spectrum. However, the camera is probably amplifying the problem.
This is a common phenomenon. I routinely work with infrared semiconductor lasers that generate a faint, tiny visible red dot – noticable only in dim light. In addition, silicon-based sensors – such as the CCD (charge-coupled device) array in your camera – also tend to be sensitive to infrared radiation. I’ve read about this phenomenon, and I’ve observed it in phototransistors and other optical sensors.
Quick! You must test this further! There was a Sony (IIRC) videocamera that was pulled off the market after it was discovered that it’s sensativity to infrared enabled one to get a pretty revealing nudge, nudge, wink, wink look at someone dressed in light clothing. If this turns out to be the case with your digital camera, I demand that you post the make and model here so that the rest of us can, uh, research know what I mean, nudge, nudge, wink, wink this!
This ability is probably on purpose. Since people give off heat, a camera that can pick up infrared will show them a little bit brighter than in ordinary light. This can help if you’re shooting pictures in low light conditions.
All digital cameras can see infrared, it’s one of the properties of a CCD. Most have filters to filter out most of it and keep the color balance correct, but they’re not perfect. Shoot a remote control at just about any video camera and you’ll see it flashing.
The camera with the special abilities is the Sony line with Nightshot. Nightsot is a special mode where the filter is moved so the camera can see all the infrared, and the camera has a little infrared LED in the front. It allows close range filming in essentially B&W and total darkness.
For using the see-through-clothes feature, the clothes have to be a specific type. It also makes it possible to see through tinted windows and a few other neat quirks. You have to buy an IR filter, though, and a good one runs around $50. It also makes everything black and white, and the clothing is more translucent than trnasparent, so you can still tell it’s there. Since it sees best through thin stuff like simming suits, and swimming suits are pretty revealing anyway, there isn’t a whole lot of point to it.
Tuckerfan, there exist certain filter lenses for cameras which can act as ‘x-ray specs’ in which you can see through people’s clothes. However, I believe it had to do with ultraviolet light, not infrared.
Yours too? Try using a Tiffen 66C amortochromatic filter to eliminate those unwanted apparations. (66B if you’re calibrated for a tungsten-based light source.)
At the photo store you can buy a infrared bulb. Turn it on & the whole room is in infrared light.
Spooky.
Yeah, I bought a Sony camcorder in 2001 that can be modded to see thru fabrics. I didn’t mod it
though but I saw a guy selling the exact model modded on that big auction site.
I haven’t used Chandra, but I used Hubble. Does that count?
But seriously, yes, most CCDs are sensitive out into the infrared. It has caused problems in the past, and in one way led to the deaths of the Heaven’s Gate cult. See this article on another BB for more info.